Happy Earth Day, Nerds! On the 50th anniversary of Earth Day, I can’t think of a better word to delve into.

Plus, we have unintentionally been giving the Earth a reprieve by staying home this year during Earth month. This video highlights some cool impacts of the global quarantine efforts on the environment.

As language enthusiasts such as myself may put together, a lot of Earth-related words sound nothing like the name of our planet: terrain, territory, terrace. These all stem from Latin’s terra, meaning “earth or land”. Other words that come from this root include the adjective to describe “of or relating to the earth or its inhabitants” (terrestrial) or the name for Earth in Guardians of the Galaxy (Terra, #NerdAlert).

In contrast, Martian (“of or relating to the planet Mars or its hypothetical inhabitants”) sounds a lot more like the name of its related planet.

So where did the name Earth come from?

One of English’s other linguistic parents: German.

Proto-Germanic for “earth, ground”: ertho
Old English for “ground, soil, dirt, dry land; country, district”: eorthe
Current English: earth

It wasn’t until the 1400s that earth began to be used as a name to refer to our planet.

This is why English is so fun/annoying. Related words, such as Earth and terrestrial, sometimes come from different linguistic ancestors, causing them to sound and look nothing alike. Because that’s not totally and completely confusing.

In case you’re curious, here are the words for earth in some other current languages, which also show the German/Latin split (courtesy of Google translate):

Dutch: aarde
German: Erde
French: Terre
Italian: terra

You can find more information on Earth Day and how to celebrate it here.

Thanks, Nerds and Happy Hump Day! Let me know in the comments or on Instagram if you have any words whose history you’re curious to learn about next!

References

Online Etymology Dictionary: earth
https://www.etymonline.com/word/earth

Merriam-Webster: terrestrial
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/terrestrial

Online Etymology Dictionary: terrace
https://www.etymonline.com/word/terrace

Merriam-Webster: Martian
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/martian